The Healer by the Melbourne, Australia based Anton Delecca Quartet, an all acoustic modal jazz tour de force, showed how well the Wireworld cables preserved tonal quality. The interplay between the instruments is sublime, and the little things -- the shimmer of cymbals, the lower register of the piano, and brassiness of Delecca’s sax -- were spot on. I had this album on repeat, and was continuously amazed how engaging it sounded.

At the tail end of the review period I purchased the classic Coldplay debut, Parachutes, now remastered in 24-192. It absolutely kills the CD sonically. Specifically, added refinement, micro detail, and a far more analog sound were all on display. Tracks like “Spies” and “Shiver” were well served the Wireworld set up. There was, again, tremendous dynamics, and lots of texture on the acoustic guitars and drums, and bass lines were highly melodic and perfectly placed in the mix.

SET UP & LISTENING: SYSTEM TWO

The office system consists of an Aric Audio Expression tubed preamp, an Onkyo M5000R power amp, a Simaudio 280D DAC, the Sonore microRendu (review forthcoming) streamer, and a pair of Magnepan MMG speakers, with a JL Audio d108 subwoofer. Everything was plugged into an Audience aR6 power conditioner.

Interconnects were the Oasis 7, the least expensive cable in the line to use Wireworld’s Quad DNA Helix design. And the Solstice 7, which uses a Dual DNA Helix design. The MMG’s were wired up with the Oasis 7 speaker cable, and Aurora 7 power cords were used throughout with a Stratus 7 used on the subwoofer. A Wireworld Silver Starlight 7 USB cable from the Sonore to the Simaudio DAC completed the picture.

In some ways, the Wireworld cables improved the sound of the office system to an even higher degree. Conventional wisdom is that better cables will only produce modest benefits with less expensive gear. I found this to be the case on other occasions. I won’t say I was surprised at how much more music I was hearing with the Wireworld second tier loom, but the degree of improvement was easy to notice.

The specific areas I noticed an immediate difference were in the solidity of the bass, and the increased drive, especially with rock music. Robin Trower’s For Earth Below, a long time favorite, came barreling into the room like a freight train, with the electric bass and drums locked in with precision, and Trower’s psychedelic guitar flurries taking no prisoners. My office system was never supposed to sound this good!

The recent remaster of Jimi Hendrix’s The Cry Of Love, the essential posthumous release of tracks that were slated for his fourth studio album, was a real revelation. Having had the original LP, I had never heard such detail, coherence, and passion in the performances. Hendrix was ascending to a creative peak at this period before his tragic passing, and songs like “Freedom”, Angel”, and “Straight Ahead” were masterpieces that were beautifully committed to tape by Eddie Kramer, Hendrix’s long time engineer. With the Wireworld cables I heard percussion parts and backing vocals more clearly than I ever remember. I also heard flaws in the recording (or the current state of the master tape) I had not noticed as much before.